Steps
by WeatherWatch
Summary: Sometimes she wonders just how her life ended up so far off track.


**Disclaimer: In no way does this have even a remote chance of being mine. Everything is JK Rowling's. Pretty much. **

OoO

Sometimes she wonders just how her life was thrown so far off track.

Then she remembers that her mother has, for reasons unknown, decided to marry Draco Malfoy, citing it as a Very Good Idea, and not, as Hermione likes to tell people only half-jokingly, a fit of insanity.

It is for this reason that Hermione finds herself sitting, on a pleasant Thursday evening, by herself on the hammock she crudely constructed in her back garden at the age of nine, feeling the eyes of her neighbour's bad-tempered, ugly, old goat boring into her from its position on top of a tree stump on the other side of the fence. She is certain it is mentally devouring the massive, expensive and utterly boring tome in her lap. For a split-second, she considers just throwing the blasted thing over the fence to be eaten, but remembers just in time that it isn't hers. Climbing out of the hammock, she returns inside, fearful of the way she has almost voluntarily committed librarian heresy.

The book is on the Malfoy family tree, and is filled with all sorts of diatribe on muggles and breeding and pureblood ideals. Initially, Hermione found it to be quite a fascinating subject, but twelve hundred pages later, and she is feeling a bit nauseas about the whole thing.

She would bet her bottom dollar that Lucius sodding Malfoy hasn't forced her mother to read this trash – even if she is his daughter-in-law to be and a muggle to boot. Actually, that is probably why Annette Granger hasn't been given the hefty book. It isn't really appropriate reading for a muggle. Besides, Lucius has hinted broadly that Hermione should relay any pivotal knowledge for her mother's sake, rather than leave it up to him, or let the woman flounder on her own.

Sitting on the kitchen table, feet resting on the seat of a chair, Hermione resigns herself to glaring at the book.

"Get off the table, Cinder-Granger. I eat there."

Draco isn't nearly as much of a prick as he used to be, a fact that possibly irks Hermione more than when he'd been a complete and utter bastard to her because it means she actually doesn't mind his constant presence in her home. The fairytale reference is a continuing joke between the two; she has her own nickname for him.

Hermione looks mournfully at the blond, sighing dramatically as he wanders into the kitchen.

"How did you ever read that?" She questions, pointing at the offending text. "It's ridiculous, sickening and full of crap."

Draco just laughs and walks over to the fruit basket.

"You think it's bad now – I was nine. The book probably weighed more than I did at the time."

Hermione grimaces, feeling sympathy for nine year old Draco, imagining a small, scrawny blond child trying to drag the enormous book behind him into the grand library, reading for days on end...

"Anyway, I came in to say that your mum wants you to go try on your bridesmaid dress." Draco interrupts her imagery, quirking an eyebrow at her dazed look as he pops a grape into his mouth. "I'm making tea, too - want a cup?"

Hermione nods, and jumps down to find her mother. "Thanks, Step-Ferret."

He throws a grape at her head in good humour.

Annette Granger is upstairs in the master bedroom looking over the pale golden bridesmaid dress, and when Hermione enters, she thrusts it upon her daughter, shooing her into the ensuite bathroom to change.

It's rather flattering – for a bridesmaid's gown. Annette beams.

OoO

Hermione and Draco sit in an almost companionable silence, drinking their tea while Annette disappears to run some errands.

"Do you-" Hermione begins, and falters, letting the silence take over once more.

She stirs her drink with a teaspoon.

"Do you ever wonder how we got here?"

Draco looks up from the Daily Prophet's sports pages that he has been casually perusing, curious to see how the new Quidditch Leagues are faring.

"Sometimes," he admits, pushing the paper away and looking up at his future step-daughter, and past classmate. "I wonder how, in a world that seemed to be collapsing around me, I found someone who knows everything I've done – all my worst memories and biggest regrets – and has forgiven me in spite of it all."

He sips his tea.

"I wonder how I managed to find love and contentment in a world so far away from what I always assumed awaited me."

Hermione lifts her legs so her heels rest on the edge of the seat, arms hugging her knees.

"I wonder how I could have been such an ignorant sod." Draco looks over at her guiltily.

"I find it strange." She confides, smiling a little. "I never would have imagined this; not in my wildest, craziest, most sugar induced dreams. But I'm happy." She glances at the blasted tome sitting opposite her. "Relatively."

Draco smirks. "Father will always enjoy provoking you."

"I know." Hermione sighs. "Even I almost like our fights. He's sharp as Doxy teeth and twice as venomous – a good sparring partner, despite his dirty tactics and superiority complex."

Annette arrives home then, a bag of groceries in one arm, as the other runs a trail up Draco's arm and over his shoulder and back while she passes by the table. Hermione feels like an intruder during moments like this, when her mother seems almost like a girl in the throes of young love, while Draco becomes a character she never once remembers seeing during their time at Hogwarts.

They are happy.

OoO

Annette is staring into Draco's eyes, as if she can't see anything or anyone beyond him, in his handsomely tailored muggle suit that he had to fight tooth and nail against his father to wear, and his smiling face reflects the same expression. Her dress is pale green – to stand for new life – and in her hair sit some pretty blossoms. She looks younger than Hermione can ever recall her looking – not that she is very old at all.

Hermione feels surprisingly content.

From the bridesmaid line, she watches the ceremony progress and feels that, perhaps, everything is righting itself, and that, maybe, her life hasn't been thrown as far off-centre as she thought.

She is happy. And happiness is all Hermione Granger can ask for.


End file.
